The Battle of the Books Judgement Night!

 Judgement Night is tonight in The Trim Castle Hotel at 8pm!

The shortlisted writers will read, I'll give my comments, and later announce the winner - the audience too will vote for their own winner who will receive the €100 Audience Prize. 'Helpful advice' will be delivered by the two mentors who will champion each of the shortlisted writers. 'Any similarity between Statler and Waldorf from The Muppets and our two Mentors, Peter Higgins and Michael Farry, is not entirely coincidental.'  It's 5 Euro entry,  and you can get tickets Here

Battle of the Books is part of The Swift Satire Festival, which is on in Trim, Co Meath over this weekend - you can check out all their events Here

Battle Of The Books Longlist 2014

Here's the 2014 Long list for the Battle of the Books! The Shortlist will be published Monday 7th July. Congratulations to everyone listed, and thanks to everyone who entered - the standard of entries was exceptionally high. For more details check out the Festival Website.

Title of piece	Prose or Poetry
Time you won’t get back	pr
The maggot as medicinal device	pr
Mary Poppins	po
Diary of an exhibition	pr
The Siege of Ushuaia	po
Foxfire	pr
Pygmalion	pr
The Letter	po
The Lunch Date	pr
Other Drivers	po
Las Vegas in the hills of Donegal	pr
Carphone, 1992	pr
Mattys maiden Voyage	pr
Ah man you should’ve seen her	pr
Preparations for the journey	pr
Untying the knot	pr
If I was your wife	po
The Good Son	pr
The Wonders of Egypt	pr
Worksearch Journey	pr
Rainbow nation	po
Bewleys	po
Apres Paris	pr
Hilda	pr
Tiny Rooms	po
Waiting for John	pr
Airport bus to the city centre	po
The three dimensional traveller	pr
A tale to tell	pr
My Ray	pr

Battle of the Books!

I'm very excited to be judging this new competition from the organiser's of the infamously fabulous Swift Festival! The Battle of the Books is a new international writing competition (open to poetry and prose) and is organised by the Swift Festival in Trim, Co Meath, Ireland. And, unusually, previously published work is accepted! The deadline is July 1st, so get sending!

Theme:‘Travel is the theme of the competition, but the interpretation of ‘travel’ will be very wide indeed... In other words, anything goes – as long as it has some mention/whiff/suggestion of travel. It can be pure fiction or memoir or any other genre of writing. Humour is not essential but it certainly won’t do an entry any harm. Entertainment is highly desirable.’

Deadline: Tuesday 1^st July, 2014.

Poems: minimum 40 lines, maximum 60 lines.

Prose: minimum 800 words, maximum 1,000 words.

Entry fee: €5 per entry or €10 for three entries.

Prize: €500

For further details and to enter - click the Festival Website *HERE*

WOW Anthology Launch

THE WOW! AWARDS

Maire T Robinson and myself
(courtesy of Michael Farry)

The WOW Awards were announced last night in Galway at the launch of the first print edition of WOW! Magazine published by Wordsonthestreet. The awards for poetry, in order of 1st, 2nd and 3rd went to; Patricia O Callaghan- Absence, Leonora Steele - Kathy, Michael Massey - At Annaghmakerrig. The awards in the short story category in order of 1st, 2nd and 3rd went to; James Lawless - Lovers Who Wound Blame It On The Storm, Brendan Murphy - On Site, Carolyne Van Der Meer - Mausoleum.

Congratulations to everyone! It's always nice to chat to other writers, it was only a week since the Hennessy Awards where James Lawless, Michael Massey, Alison Wells and myself had met under similar circumstances. Last night was a more relaxed celebration, with lots of champagne (which is very... relaxing) and both Michael and James were award winners! James's novel, The Avenue, will be launched at The Irish Writers Centre on the 6th May. Michael Farry, poet and editor of Boyne Berries Magazine was also shortlisted, as was Maire T Robinson who is a member of the Atlantis Collective and a graduate of the MA in Writing from NUI.

I started to read the anthology on the drive home... Tony O' Dwyer and Geraldine Burke (Wordsonthestreet) have produced a wonderful magazine and for an emerging writer, publications such as this are vital. I dare you to read Moya Roddy's excellant `Butterflies` and not be disturbed.

Having lived in Galway for 14 yrs it was wonderful to be back for the night, catching up with some good friends who I hadn't seen in a long, long time. One of my highlights, as always, was getting to Charlie Byrnes Bookshop - where I bought Ropes 18, Painting Rain by Paula Meehan and Red Riding Hood's Dilemma by Orfhlaith Foyle... Heaven!

WATCH OUT! BATTLE OF THE BOOKS
Paddy Smith kindly let me know about the up coming Battle of the Books at the Trim Swift Festival (July 1-4) ;

"We use 'the Simon Cowell approach' in the annual Battle of the Books between the Boyne Writers Group and the Meath Writers Circle. Teams of 4 from each group read their satirical writing pieces (poetry and prose) in front of an audience and then submit to robust comments from a panel of 3 judges. Hair-raising stuff -- and not for the faint-hearted! Boyne Writers won it last year by one mark (94-93) and the return match this year is being eagerly awaited."